“Golden Rule Tax Disobedience” Campaign Starts in U.K.

In a proposal similar to the “comprehensive disobedience” movement that was
pioneered by Spanish activists, a group in the United Kingdom has inaugurated a
“Golden Rule Tax Disobedience” campaign. In their words:

The latest tax scandal is bringing the erosion of our democracy into ever
sharper focus. Britain suffers under an enormous democratic deficit due to
state capture by “free”-market neoliberal fundamentalism and its associated
corporate and financial interests, in aggressive ascendancy
since the 1970s. Notwithstanding the
2008 financial crisis, this capture of the state
has remained unaddressed, with successive governments shamefully complicit in
it. Despite copious corroborative research and endless petitioning and
protesting, all we’ve seen is disingenuous hand-wringing and political
evasion.

Our collusion with this apology for a “democracy” must stop. We, the
citizenry, are therefore taking matters into our own hands — with a “Golden
Rule Tax Disobedience” whose intention is grassroots mobilisation against
systemic injustice, favouring far greater equality, shared and stable
prosperity, enhanced quality of life and, most importantly, an environmentally
sustainable future.

The evidential rationale for this action is overwhelming. Not least, £93bn of
“corporate welfare” is given as handouts annually to businesses operating in
our allegedly “free” market; and the government spends £26bn subsidising
harmful fossil fuels, yet a mere £3.5bn subsidising renewables. “Free”-market
fundamentalism has been an astonishing failure for the vast majority.

Our Golden Rule Tax Disobedience initiative asks citizens to withhold a small
amount of tax (through
VAT or their tax
return — everyone can join in), and then donate it to conducive campaigning
groups. This principled modelling of a redistributive ethos intends to shame
our politicians into taking effective action.

Principled tax activism has a long and distinguished history in circumstances
where the state has shown itself incapable of defending the public interest.
With no serious attempt by government to correct Britain’s massive democratic
deficit, our initiative is an idea whose time has come. We ask you to join
with us in taking back power in order to create a fairer and more sustainable
society.

Dr Gail Bradbrook — Director, Compassionate Revolution

Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett — Co-authors of The Spirit Level

George Barda — Social justice and Occupy campaigner, Compassionate Revolution

Aline Sitoe
Diatta was, says Wikipedia, “a Senegalese heroine of the opposition to
French colonialism, often called the Joan of Arc or the Marianne of
Senegal.” When the French colonial administrators of the region where the
Diola people lived began conscripting locals to fight in European wars and
to engage in confiscatory taxation of rice and cattle, the Diola resisted.
Aline Sitoe Diatta was one of the leaders of this resistance, and also a
martyr: she was arrested and tortured, and died while imprisoned in
exile. Emitai is a film about these uprisings from the Senegalese point of view.

Sieglinde Baumert has spent two months in prison
for her refusal to pay a €17½ monthly television tax to support the
government-run station. The tax, which formerly was based on the number of
televisions in a household, is now assessed on everyone in Germany whether
or not they have a television.

Have you caught the
tax evasion bug? The recent leaks of the “Panama Papers,” with their
details of how the 1% stash their money in shell companies in tax havens,
have increased perceptions that the tax system is gamed by the rich and
powerful — and have decreased the willingness of the average joe to
continue getting fleeced.

[IRS chief] Koskinen
says the main factor that drives ordinary Americans to stop paying their
taxes, or to try to cheat on their taxes, is the perception that others
are doing the same. If you think that your neighbors are not paying their
fair share, you’re just a little less likely to pay your own tax bill in
full or in part.

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